Diabetes Could be a Hidden Condition for Heart Disease Patients

Researchers at the University of Warwick have discovered diabetes could be a hidden condition for some patients with coronary heart disease.

In a study led by Dr Saverio Stranges, Associate Professor of Cardiovascular Epidemiology at WarwickMedicalSchool, the team looked at levels of oxidative stress in the body (a toxic effect which causes cell damage).

They
found high levels of oxidative stress in people with coronary heart
disease, previously thought to be a marker of the heart condition,
could instead indicate a condition of glucose abnormality, such as
overt type 2 diabetes.

The
research team took blood samples to contrast oxidative stress levels in
people with coronary heart disease, people with type 2 diabetes and
healthy control subjects.

Previous studies have
shown people with type 2 diabetes and people with coronary heart
disease have high levels of oxidative stress. Dr Stranges’
team expected to produce similar results, but they found that those
stress levels were low in people with coronary heart disease but
without type 2 diabetes. Further investigation showed people from this group with high levels also had overt type 2 diabetes.

The
research used data taken from the Western New York Health Study. This
was a case-control study of myocardial infarction and cardiovascular
risk factors among residents of Erie and Niagara Counties, New York.

Dr
Stranges said: “The results were intriguing. We expected to find high
levels of oxidative stress in people with a clinical heart condition,
such as myocardial infarction, and people with diabetes. As we thought,
the levels were high for diabetics, but there were some discrepancies
for people with heart disease.“Our findings
suggest the observed associations of increased oxidative stress in
individuals with heart disease may be dependent on underlying
abnormalities in glucose metabolism.”

Additional
contributors to the study were Dr Joan Dorn, Professor Richard Donahue,
Professor Jo Freudenheim, Kathleen Hovey and Professor Maurizio
Trevisan from the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, State
University of New York at Buffalo, NY, USA; Dr Richard Browne from the Department of Biotechnical and Clinical Laboratory Sciences, State University of New York at Buffalo, NY, USA

For
more information or to speak to Dr Stranges, contact Kelly
Parkes-Harrison, Communications Officer, University of Warwick, 02476
150483, 07824 540863